What is right and what is easy
by Incarnadine
Summary: The inner thoughts of one of the darkest Slytherins, as he tries to make a choice that will shape his future. One shot. Contains references to suicide.


**Disclaimer:** The characters and locations used in this story belong to J.K. Rowling and not to the author.

**Author's Note:** By the end, you should have a good idea of whose thoughts these are. I make no apology for the use of the second person throughout; it wasn't a stylistic decision, the story just came to me as it is. The title is taken from Dumbledore's speech at the end of _Goblet of Fire_.

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**What is right and what is easy**

"_Constantly choosing the lesser of two evils is still choosing evil."_ (Jimmy Garcia)

You can't remember how this started, but you know it's ending soon. One way or the other, it's got to end. You can't take much more of this. Something's got to give. No one can go on this way, in this perpetual uncertainty. You certainly can't. You change your mind a hundred times a day, the hour of reckoning is close at hand and you still don't know what you're going to do, which path you're going to take.

It's not this hard for everyone else. You aren't sure why it is, but everyone except you seems to know which side they're on. They're all waiting for you. And you just don't know. You've never been good at choosing sides. That must be how you got into this mess in the first place. Back when you were a child, a team picked you, and you were happy to go along with it. You aren't a child any more, and you don't think that you still want to play.

That's it: you don't want to change sides. You just don't want to be a part of the game. But everyone is a part of this game, whether they want to be or not. Running and hiding won't do you any good. Look what it did to Karkaroff. There can be no running, and you can't hide from life. Because that's what this game is. Life. You have to pick one side or the other, because if you don't, everyone will be against you.

And that is your problem, isn't it? You have to choose, but you don't know what you really want. Good and evil mean nothing to you. You don't believe that either of them actually exists. You know Potter, the hero, and you know him for what he is: foolhardy, arrogant, and sometimes even cruel. Your father's evil, they tell you. But you know him as the man who loved you as a child, who still loves you, who spoils you rotten, even if he does want to force your hand in this big decision.

You know everyone, and you know that none of them are what they are meant to be. No one is as black or as white as they're painted. Everyone is a different shade of grey. You know this, but you don't know which shade you are yet. And you're running out of time to find out. You want to laugh at the irony of it. You know far too much about everyone else, and not nearly enough about yourself.

All this time you've acted like you know who you are, like you've thrown in your lot with your father. And they've believed it. You know that you've fooled your father, and you're pretty sure you've fooled Dumbledore. But none of them know the real you, and none of them know your true choice, because you don't know yourself.

There's no one you can ask for help. No one outside of this House, no one who is free from the suffocating weight of the green and silver colours will help you. And the people here will probably tell you what your duty is, same as your father does. You don't _care_ about your duty. You want to do what is right for you. You don't want to regret your actions, assuming you live to regret them. You don't want to follow blindly and then find that your leader was blind all along.

There is a way out that you can see. The only way you can avoid the choice is to get out of the game. You know now that it's a possibility. Last week Blaise threw himself out of a seventh floor window. Every bone in his body broke, you heard. And you know why he did it. He did it for the same reasons that you are now contemplating the same thing. You didn't know him that well, maybe you never liked him, but you are the same as he was. You have the same dilemma that he had. Dare you take the same way out?

Your father said he was a coward. Dumbledore said that he was a troubled soul. People can say the words that they know they ought to say, but that doesn't make them true. And the truth is, you, and only you, understand Blaise. You're well on your way to becoming him. How much further does it have to go before something cracks, and that something is you? How far gone do you have to be before _you_ hurl yourself out of the highest window you can find?

You just don't know. You're heading for the Astronomy tower, telling yourself that you're only going for the air, when you know that you're really going to test yourself, to see if you are strong enough to do what you have to do. People look at you strangely, and you realise, numbly, that it's because you're alone. How many times have you ever walked alone? You wonder now, will you ever be allowed to walk your own road?

There's a strangely cooling breeze. You stand there near the edge, looking down. You feel faintly sick. Flying never affected you like this. You never thought about how far up you were, even when you were competing with the clouds. But now, the sheer distance between you and the ground frightens you. You know now why Blaise's bones broke. You know that he knew when he jumped that he could never survive. And you know that, if you were to try to do the same, no one would stop you. No one would miss you. Except your father, and he's evil, so he can't feel any sort of human emotion, can he? But you know that's not true. If you do this, it will kill him. It isn't just suicide, its murder.

And you know what you have to do. You can't go on like this. You rummage around in your pocket until your hand finds what it's looking for, and you pull out the knife. You stare at the blade for a moment, mesmerised by it as it shines in the weak sunlight. Then you steel yourself, and throw it over the side. You watch it fall, see it hit the ground and hope that the blade shattered. Blaise left you that knife. He left it under your pillow. There was no note. There didn't need to be one. You knew who had put it there and you knew why. He was leading you into temptation. And now that temptation is gone.

You feel relieved that you are stronger than Blaise. You still don't know what to do, but you know that you're going to make that choice. You owe it to yourself. You remember what Dumbledore said after Cedric Diggory died. You never liked the boy, you thought he was all brawn and nothing upstairs, but you remember the words, nevertheless. You've just made that choice. You've thrown away the thing that tempted you to take the easy way out. Now all you have to decide is what you think is right…


End file.
